


Lost as a candle lit at noon

by dovahfiin



Series: the stars are not wanted now [4]
Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-08
Updated: 2017-07-25
Packaged: 2018-11-29 05:46:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,322
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11434416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dovahfiin/pseuds/dovahfiin
Summary: The evolution of Wilhuff Tarkin's relationship with Orson Krennic during the initial phases of the Death Star's construction.





	1. I am not yours

**Author's Note:**

> The bit of backstory no one wanted but was necessary all the same.
> 
> I think I always meant for Krennic to take the place of Natasi Daala, and I put that piece together last night; so here we are. I'm assuming Thalassa Tarkin's maiden name was Motti.
> 
> Unapologetic about being AU. It seems to be how I prefer to write things.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Governor Wilhuff Tarkin marries Thalassa Motti.
> 
> Orson Krennic is an arbiter of truth above the terror his machine created, but history will not remember that as such.

There are larks perched in the trees by the lake, no doubt imported and paid for by the Motti estate, but their birdsong is no less lovely for it. They aren't a species native to Naboo, but they take to the flora and fauna as well as any animal capable of adaptation. Even still, he can tell that they are unsure of their talons wrapping around branches their primordial brains cannot recognize; their behavior is that of cornered beasts.

 _As if_ , he scoffs. Were they to simply unfurl their wings, they would find liberation on the orange-swirled horizon their beady eyes keep scanning.

A wedding on Coruscant with an Imperial justice would have sufficed, but the Motti family is not utilitarian. Impossibly wealthy, they assert their high profile and affluence across the galaxy whenever the opportunity arises. It arose when Thalassa was betrothed to Wilhuff, and it arose again when the Emperor himself decreed that the wedding would take place amid the festivities of Empire Day on Naboo; his native planet.

It was droll and it was predictable, but it was still necessary - both for the Tarkin estate and for the Empire - so he allowed the festivities to skyrocket into a stratosphere of decadence he wouldn't have otherwise permitted - shimmersilk napkins and all.

Thalassa was classically beautiful but he could already tell that she would mature into a handsome if not severe looking woman. He wasn't attracted to her, and it hadn't been a requisite part of the betrothal regardless, but the thought of procreating (he'd had to guarantee one heir for the Motti family line) nauseated him.

Not only did it make him ill, but it came with a depth of feeling a man of his rank should not be exploring anyway, let alone on his wedding day.

Orson was off somewhere in Theed, no doubt carousing or enjoying any number of exotic beauties and intoxicants. Tarkin was torn between allowing it and ripping him away from whatever handmaiden he'd coaxed behind a darkened alabaster column to shake some kind of recognizance into him. It wasn't what he wanted, but it's what duty compelled him to do and Krennic should be more _sympathetic_ , especially after a years-long game of taag-and-mouse with that stunted Erso fool.

What a mess, anyway.

When Krennic appeared on time and wearing a dress uniform perfectly pressed with his saber polished (the corner of Tarkin's lip curled at conceiving of the obvious and perhaps uncouth parallel it presented), he was truly surprised. He wasn't even drinking, nor had he been.

They were able to slip away before Thalassa and her family arrived. Tucked down further, right on the sand, away from any other reveler or wedding attendee. The key that had been in the pocket of his dress jodhpurs was a heavy weight in a several ways.

"I can't have Thalassa finding them, but I don't want them far from me either. Consider it a - a gift."

Krennic's eyes scanned the rolling hills beyond the other side of the lake. Tarkin wanted to slap him.

"And you say they're poems?"

"After a fashion. It's more like a compendium of advice for two men who cannot possess that which they most ardently desire due to. . . duty."

"Duty" Krennic repeats, completely gone from the moment and his eyes glazed over in disbelief.

"You can find me in those tomes, Ors. I am not far. Even as I take her hand today, I am not lost."

He gently places the key in Orson's left-hand pocket. "You know where they are", his voice drops softly, his face hovering inches away from Krennic's own. He wants to do more, but they are still within plain view. Even this closeness would come at a cost. "I'll understand if they're not gone, but it would wound me. Do not go like that."

When Krennic catches his eyes again, his smile somehow escapes Tarkin's notice.


	2. Lost as a snowflake in the sea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Governor Tarkin goes to a shipyard to discuss the future - and all its iterations - with Orson Krennic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So there was this theory for a while that the Death Star was also a machine borne of mercy in case of a Yuuzhan Vong attack, and I rather fucking love it.

There were enough self-evident reasons to go to Kartoosh.

First, he'd heard of it as being Krennic's brainchild; dismantled ship components were retrofit for unique fighters and ships not in production elsewhere. This also meant that those ships were appointed with equally unique weaponry, and Tarkin had a vested interest in such developments. The Emperor had already called Tarkin to an audience to discuss the Project Celestial Power, still very much in its infancy and not even worth a proper name, but he wasn't fool enough to refuse that the timing wasn't perfect. Krennic's meteoric rise to expanded responsibility, specifically within Project Celestial Power, was due largely to the operation on Kartoosh.

He was uninterested in the red-faced squalling newborn he'd been given paternity leave to coo over. He'd produced an heir as was his sole mandate in the marriage; as far as he was concerned, his responsibilities had been satisfied. Thalassa hadn't taken exception to his absence; if anything, he had been in the way.

Lastly, he hadn't seen Krennic since his wedding on Naboo.

Orson had always been rather young-looking, but his face had thinned and the web of wrinkles in the corners of his eyes from nights spent squinting over schematic 'plasts had caught up with him.

There was _silver_ in his hair. Not much, but just enough to complete the illustration of beleaguered, hardworking servitude to the Empire. Enough to denote ambition.

"Orson." He couldn't control the desperation in his voice. His heart dully thudded in his chest.

"Wil, thank you for coming. I hear congratulations are in order."

"Procreation is hardly something worth commending. It is a biological function."

"Indeed."

He kissed Orson hard, teeth clacking and hands searching for a brace on either side of his neck, pulling him forward until Orson's shorter frame was flush with his.

"You are a disloyal boy. I can taste it on you."

Orson didn't rebuke the statement. Lying would only prolong the inevitable but it didn't matter, because Tarkin gently pushed him away to palm out the wrinkles on his uniform from their brief and relatively chaste coupling. Krennic took the lead through the shipyard proper until they arrived at the compound. They shuttled into his office, Krennic slamming the door behind them without much fanfare.

"Project Celestial Power could be what changes the course of galactic history, Wil. A weapon boasting that amount of power would ensure that entire systems fall in under the Empire's banner. And if the Emperor is concerned about the Yuuzhan Vong -" Tarkin's eyes could have shot blaster bolts.

"How in the nine hells do you know about that?"

"Friends in high places."

Tarkin's face betrayed jealousy and he knew it; there was little doubt that Krennic had achieved the desired effect. "Don't you think that at this point the Empire is unconcerned with our little affair by now? Their two greatest minds are here, discussing the future, and you want to reduce this beautiful promise to ash because you're _jealous_."

"Fidelity is a cornerstone attribute of any good officer."

"What is Thalassa's position on fidelity?"

Before he can blink, his face is stinging and his ears ring with the familiar tone after having been struck hard.

"Do not ever speak of my wife again. It is because of her efforts, and her credits, that Project Celestial Power is even being remotely considered in Imperial high command. Your appointment, this shipyard, is a consolation. It is a balm for what I've done." The last of his monologue tapered into a nearly imperceptible whisper. He was horrified by the telltale despair in Krennic's eyes, and couldn't bring himself to acknowledge what he was sure was a betrayal of his own.

"Don't presume to placate me, Wil. I don't require pity. I don't require recompense." He looked over Tarkin's shoulder to ensure no one could see the bold embrace in which the taller man was enfolded in a second's time. "Let's not do this. This is work, not pleasure, and we need to understand one another perfectly if this project is to move forward out of a dream and into organizational infancy."

"I know."

Krennic pulled himself away, sitting down behind an austere durasteel desk. Tarkin let his eyes water while he looked down at the younger man.

"What sort of compound could even come close to producing such a fantastic weapon?"

"Kyber."

****

* * *

Before he returned to the _Sovereign_ , Governor Tarkin gave a distinct order to declassify the Erso file.

Krennic might not need recompense, but he would need forgiveness; and that was something Wilhuff Tarkin would never afford him.


	3. Lost as a light is lost in light

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A tableau of a funeral.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Canon: Garoche Tarkin is killed by Darth Vader and was also an Imperial defector. This act, the death of his son, is used by Palpatine to propel Tarkin toward moving forward with the Death Star plans.
> 
> Also: SPACE KILTS! And I make up a bunch of shit about Eriaduan religious practice by interpolating Russian Orthodoxy!

He follows the rest of the funeral procession, mist cutting them all off at their waists as the pallbearers hold aloft the stone vault containing the remains of the sole Tarkin heir. They move together, they breathe together, across the lush zoysia grass still glistening with morning dew even as the hour drags on into mid-morning. Krennic realizes that his footfalls don't bend the strong stuff, as if the very ground were saturated with the resolve of the man who had avenged his son's death with the blood of every Atoan he could find.

The crypt in which generations of Tarkins were interred was large, not durastone compound but built in a time before synthetics. The etching of the name **Tarkin** was not proud or stately, but rather decrepit - perhaps there was something regal about decay, something sacred about the way the carved stone name seemed to have weathered with the passage of time.

It was disquieting, being on a planet not controlled by a WeatherNet. Krennic had donned plainclothes and chased mist on the moors for most of the morning before the service, marveling that precipitant could hang suspended in the air; certainly he knew the science behind it, but to hold out his hand and feel the chill between his fingers and raise the flesh of his wrist - that was another thing.

Eriadu was still a planet steeped in liturgical spiritualist practice, so a holyman attired in a thick black bell-sleeved rassa led the charge of mourners, swinging a thurible and chanting as they made their way across the expansive grounds of the cathedral. On the edge of the nearly-wild zoysia was the crypt, and beyond it the untamed but no less stunning edge of the Carrion. Perhaps Tarkin truly believed that generations of his family could master its perils even unto death. It seemed too droll a philosophy for such a pragmatic man.

Tarkin was dressed in an uncharacteristically black dress uniform, his pips and rank bar clothed in black as well to show that he also mourned for a fellow Imperial officer. Krennic could hear Thalassa's congested sniffling from under her funerary veil, and while it was clear that the parents of Garoche Tarkin were grieving, they stood only as close together as was expected. Lady Tarkin refused Wil's arm when he offered it, but the rejection of physical contact didn't seem to derail Tarkin at all. In fact, and only Krennic saw this, but Tarkin seemed visibly relieved.

The Motti family representatives, Thalassa, and Wilhuff all entered the tomb's foyer. Tarkin waved on to follow behind him.

A circular foyer greeted them with a dais in the middle on which laid an ancient ceremonial saber draped with a stretch of fabric denoting that the Tarkin family was laid to rest in that place. Tarkin had told Krennic during a more tender moment that his family was one of several across Eriadu with a tartan; many times Orson had observed the older man bedecked in the regalia of his homeworld, a kind of knee-length garment in squares of the same colors he observed wrapped around the weapon on the dais. He had laughed at him then, and Tarkin had answered with a lecture on family pride and what can be gained from a strong name. The gravity of its actual meaning settled in gooseflesh as the temperature seemed to drop by a few noticeable degrees as they traveled further into the crypt.

Before them was a long, torchlit stretch of vaults and columbarium. Each niche or vault was inscribed with a name and their respective Life Date, and the date of their death. Tarkin lead the holyman and the detail of pallbearers down so far that Krennic couldn't discern facial features, and they stopped. Tarkin ordered an about face, and the pallbearers moved to lower the casket containing the remains of Garoche Tarkin into a vault before summoning a hyperlift to secure the stone seal. Without hesitating, Tarkin ordered a second about face and marched the detail back down to meet the mourners while the holyman stayed behind to anoint the burial place. He would be sealed in the tomb to guard it overnight lest any other spirits depart from its hallowed hall. Krennic shivered.

When they emerged from the crypt, the remaining mourners wordlessly departed after a curt nod from Tarkin to signal that the observances had ended. Thalassa fell in with the Motti family, walking back slowly toward the cathedral to pay their respects according to their faith. They were a far more religious family than Tarkin's, and even while he looked out beyond his wife and toward the cathedral, he knew that he would not find the absolution there that others would. Orson waited, unmoving, until all of the attendants had left before schooling what he knew was a thinly-veiled gaze at Wilhuff.

The man looked defeated, but he stood strongly in it. He had lost a son, an officer, a loyal Imperial servant. Those who had seen to his demise had been eradicated, but that would not unseal the tomb. Krennic ran his palm above Tarkin's beltline, feeling the space where his ribs sloped into an almost concave stomach. He had become far too thin.

"I will entertain your motion to begin construction when I return to the _Sovereign_."

"As you wish."

Tarkin's eyes snapped into Orson's, the intensity as arresting as any imploding star. When he grasped Orson's arm and lead him behind the tomb to the treeline, he did not fight the metallic tang of blood on his lip when Tarkin bit down, a single, shuddering sob pinning him to the cracked stone.

And then they were apart and away, expanding the space between them as suddenly as they had come together with harried steps in the still-dense grass. The wind had begun to whip through the plains, sending Orson's hair in two different directions and sweeping over a brow stitched with consternation and Wilhuff Tarkin hated how he keened at the pitiful sight of it over his shoulder.


	4. A taper in a rushing wind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The hells hath no fury like a Tarkin scorned.
> 
> Or, what Tarkin did for his twisted conceptualization of love.

Betrayal is the way of the Sith, and is thus the way of the Empire. Wilhuff Tarkin has had to remind himself of this fact many times, chanting it as though it were some twisted mantra. He had known his son; he knew that there had been some level of conscience pulling him away to rebel against the atrocities committed by the Emperor. He knew that Garoche had not died at the hands of Atoans, but they had suffered regardless for a loss to which they hadn't contributed. Even though Tarkin knew these things, he pushed forward because he was motivated by the prospect of remaining in some seat of power.

And his power had grown since Garoche's untimely death. Concurrent to his new position, Orson's power had multiplied tenfold.

The funeral was the last time they had spoken. That had been slightly over one standard year ago; but now, Tarkin had an inescapable transfer order on his desk and no one else he could solicit for advice on what to do about it.

Krennic had been at the villa with his new pretty _wife_ , Lieutenant Jyn Erso, which was delicious in and of itself since the transfer order detailed Galen Erso's desire to leave the Imperial Center and take up the last of his work at a nearly decrepit outpost on Eadu - a kyber refinery and quite possibly the least glamorous posting he could have asked for. No one in their right mind would request to be posted there. Rumors of stormtroopers buying and selling their postings to avoid Eadu were prolific.

Again, betrayal is the way of the Empire.

He signed and submitted the order hours ago.

Orson sat across from him, eyes practically spurting fire from their irises, while he waited for Tarkin to speak.

"You are truly a menace."

"So I hear. But those in lofty positions of command can only assume that it is jealousy which drives those assertions, hm?"

Krennic's fists clenched and his jaw worked - gods, he so badly wanted to spout of with an impetuous retort and Tarkin could tell. In fact, he almost wanted the impertinent boy to say something that would get him formally disciplined.

"Galen Erso is leaving Coruscant. He requested a transfer and I granted it. I act in the best interests of the Empire, Orson, not your ego."

The silence in reply was the loudest Tarkin had ever heard.

****

* * *

"Has your operative been briefed?"

"Yes, but he thinks that this order came from _us_. We aren't in the business of killing, Wilhuff."

"Perhaps not, but his death is mutually beneficial. We've discussed this exhaustively. Is he or is he not prepared?"

"The detail is en route to Eadu now."

"Very well. Contact me when it is done."

The other end of the comm went dead. Mon Mothma was never one for extraneous pleasantries, much to Tarkin's delight.

****

* * *

The rain beat down on the platform around them, Death Troopers looking on cautiously as Krennic approached a bent and bloodied Galen Erso.

"Gale -"

"It doesn't matter. You have Jyn. You have the last piece of me - the only reason I stayed."

"The only reason?"

Galen didn't respond. He didn't have to. The X Wing fighters above their heads rained down proton pulse bombs and before he had time to breathe, one of the Troopers pulled him away from where he had stood a second before so close -

A transmission from Tarkin was the first communique to alert about three minutes after the thrusters sent them into Eadu's atmosphere.

"Director Krennic, while I recognize and somewhat enjoy your proclivity toward bombast, I am baffled by how quickly this got out of control."

"REBELS, you dusty relic." His leg vaguely hurt. One of the Troopers jammed a synthedeine pen into the right thigh of his judhpur and soon his anger was masked by a strong painkiller. "I didn't have time to react. One minute Galen was babbling about Jyn and the next he was blown a meter away from me."

"Is he dead?"

"It's bloody likely!"

"Indeed. You are being recalled to Coruscant. Abort any course you have set; your presence is required here."

The transmission was dead before Krennic could emit the low growling expletives he had saved just for this occasion. Something had warned him away from Eadu, but he had wanted so badly to warn Galen - they all knew about the plans. He would have been safer on Coruscant.

Falling back into the passenger bay seat, Troopers inspecting their gear and performing minor repairs, Krennic let himself slip into the familiar lull of mild chemical intoxication. At least by the time they arrived, he would be prepared for whatever new torturous vindication Tarkin would no doubt conjure.

All this because he married Jyn Erso. All this because of Galen's dream.

****

* * *

"It's done."

"Not by the hand of your assassin. What in the nine hells was _that_ , Senator, and why am I having to explain a terrorist attack to the Imperial Senate _again_?"

"He's dead. Isn't that enough?"

Normally the Bothan senator didn't have the upper hand in their dealings, though she did have a point. Galen Erso was confirmed dead, and that was the entire point of the attack on Eadu. That the rebels showed up guns blazing wasn't the fault of either of them.

"We shared a mutual goal and it has been, through means beyond our control, satisfied. The means are not what we agreed upon, however, which compels me to alter our agreement."

She doesn't hesitate, knowing as she does that she is now painted into a corner. "Very well."

"Scarif."

"I beg your pardon?"

"Scarif is where the plans are housed, in a massive Citadel guarded by some of the Empire's most elite forces."

He almost thought she had terminated the transmission; Mon Mothma fell eerily silent.

"Why would you tell me this?"

"You simply possess a thing of equal value."

"I cannot imagine what that would be, Wilhuff."

"Krennic. Give me Krennic."

Standing alone in the war room, jaw agape, Mon Mothma could only guess as to how Orson Krennic could be as valuable as the Death Star plans themselves. One man couldn't possibly be worth the lives lost already in their pursuit; though he was the figurehead of the project, it was her understanding that Galen Erso had been the brilliant mind behind its construction. A military director pushing flimsiplasts could hardly amount to the value of the now-dead Erso.

"You're mad."

"You lose a son, you make choices that keep you in power, and you watch as that which you truly and most ardently desire is slowly ripped away from your grasp over a period of years. You go through all these things, Senator, and try to tell me again that I am not utterly clearheaded. It's only madness if you've lost nothing."

"You assume that those fighting against the Empire haven't lost."

"We all lose, Mon. Peace is a lie. Give me Krennic or I will reveal the location of your base and have you all immolated."

To play the game, one must acquiesce to certain terms. The terms changed when Galen Erso died not with well-timed sniperfire but quite by accident. Survival is adaptation's sole beneficiary.

"I agree."

"I'm glad we can move forward together. Do not contact me until after you have made the appropriate arrangements."

It was his turn to abruptly end transmission, and when he did the weight of what he had done did not cease pressing down on his shoulders - like that of his son's casket, or Orson's head on his chest.


	5. Life has loveliness to sell

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After knowing Cassian, Jyn thinks she understands how complex people can be.
> 
> She never really knew Wilhuff Tarkin. The man only lives on through her husband's very occasional reverie.

There's not much to do in exile. Orson does a lot of reading, though the aged books Jyn once saw him thumb through are long gone along with the rest of the effects from their former lives. Sometimes she'll go out and tend the garden, tilling soil and planting trama for their tea; going back over the patches of dead things Orson left in his attempts to work the land. She smiles when she sees the curling brown husks, brushing them into the bin and moving on to the next row of vegetables. He fishes, and only rarely hunts - in any case, their meals are a far cry from what the feted Imperial calf had once provided them.

She still cuts his hair in the way he'd worn it then. He had grown it out shortly after they had arrived and had achieved gloriously thick silvered curls, but she had laughed and he acknowledged that some habits are unbreakable. She still wound her hair, though not in the tight regulation bun she had tamed the unruly mane she inherited from Lyra.

They'd lost a child. A stillborn boy named Ben. Orson only sometimes wept, now, but that was years ago.

Does enough time ever pass to be able to talk about their hand in the way the galaxy had changed? Does enough time ever pass to be able to discuss the death of a child? Somehow she wondered if losing Ben hadn't achieve some sort of balance.

Jyn still remembered the smell of Cassian Andor. Blaster bolts and grease, dirt and tobacco. A working man; a man who was used to hard labor of both the emotional and physical sort. Born into the rebellion's cause, he knew the value of information over lives - and he'd built an entire life predicated on the notion that with enough information, the body count would justify a win for the rebellion.

And even though he operated with the callous detachment of a man hardened with the unfairness of his station, the body count still kept him in the throes of night terrors. Jyn remembered watching him writhe, haunted by specters of his past she couldn't see.

Sometimes Orson cried out in his sleep; incoherent and babbling, the words some language Jyn couldn't understand and which she assumed was the same one written in those ancient tomes at the villa. After years of auditing his conscience, the former Imperial military director had learned that the most inhumane punishment was to live.

"Tarkin had a son."

"Who would ever -"

Orson shot her a look of warning, but there was an inkling of playfulness behind his eyes. "He was married, in fact."

"To a woman?" Jyn couldn't hide her incredulity. It was now understood that Tarkin had been resolute in all facets of his identity and had enjoyed what now amounted to extramarital affairs with a small cadre of male colleagues.

Krennic waved his hand. "Before he assumed command of the Death Star, yes. He was married to a Motti, and they funded a noteworthy portion of Project Celestial Power. Anyway, Garoche Tarkin - Wilhuff's only son - was killed by _Lord Vader_. I don't think Wil ever knew."

"Is that what spurned him into command?"

"Partially."

"And you?"

Orson laughs without smiling. "I was young, which is no excuse, and he seemed to be the only way to Galen."

Jyn's mind worked. She had long since accepted that her father had, on some level, loved Orson Krennic - and that the feelings had been mutual. Everything Orson had ever done had been to save Galen Erso.

"So you pretended to love Tarkin?"

"I did, after a fashion. I hate myself for it."

"Like when a captive falls in love with their captor."

He sighs. That's answer enough.


End file.
